Upgrade your Gingerbread Men this year by doubling up and making Gingerbread Man Sandwiches. These delicious treats are twice as tasty, filled with a gingerbread buttercream icing and decorated with icing and sprinkles, they’re an excellent baking project for your kitchen this year.
WHY YOU WILL LOVE THIS RECIPE
Twice as delicious | One gingerbread is never enough, so now you can enjoy double helpings with these Gingerbread Man Sandwiches. Plus if two gingerbread wasn’t enough, you’ll absolutely love the gingerbread buttercream filling too.
A Christmas classic | Gingerbread is a Christmas classic whether it be in the form of people or houses. The smell instantly fills the house with festive joy and it’s an activity the whole family can enjoy. You could even set up mini stations for putting them together so everybody gets the chance to be involved.
Make Ahead | If you’re entertaining or want to make these ahead for a party or activity then you can easily make the gingerbread men ahead of time and freeze them until they’re needed. All you’ll need to do in advance of filling and decorating will be to ensure they’re fully defrosted.
5 TIPS FOR PERFECT GINGERBREAD MAN SANDWICHES
Room Temperature Ingredients | As with many bakes room temperature ingredients will ensure that everything is mixed together perfectly. Softened butter allows the sugar and butter to work together properly and room temp eggs will allows the egg yolk to break down easily and combine with the other ingredients.
Avoid adding too much flour | The perfect gingerbread is firm but soft and chewy. Adding too much flour can cause them to become crumbly which we don’t need. When it comes to rolling out the dough though, you can be slightly more generous when flouring the surface and rolling pin as the dough will be quite sticky.
Don’t overwork the dough | – Gingerbread cookies should be firm but not tough. The toughness is caused by the dough being worked too much so once it’s come to together try to avoid kneading it any more than it needs to be. This can easily happen if you re-roll the dough out more times than needed after cutting out shapes so a great tip is to map out the shapes well and cut out as many gingerbread men as you can
Let the dough chill | This step is important as the dough must chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours. I prefer 3 hours. Chilling the dough allows the flavours to deepen and develop giving you the perfect rich gingerbread flavour. Additionally you want a dough that’s easy to work with and you’ll need the dough to keep it’s shape when cut out and the only way to get both is by ensuring it’s well chilled.
Store the baked cookies air tight | The beauty of a gingerbread man is that it gets better by the day. If stored well in a clean, air-tight container they will last for up to 7 days. Alternatively you can choose to make these ahead and freeze them for up to 2 months. This is a great idea if you want to gift them for Christmas or have a batch ready for unexpected guests around the Christmas period.
TOOLS YOU WILL NEED TO MAKE THESE GINGERBREAD MAN SANDWICHES
To get the perfect Gingerbread Man Sandwiches you’ll need to make sure you’ve got all the tools and equipment. See below my recommend list
Large Mixing Bowl | There is quite a lot of mixture so you’ll want a good sized bowl for mixing all the ingredients together
Measuring spoons | These ensure you get the perfect quantities and right balance of spices and molasses
Gingerbread Man cutters | Rather than just buying one, buying a set of sizes means you have a cutter for all needs and can mix up your cookie sizes if you wanted to.
Rolling Pin | A good non-stick rolling pin will still need coating in flour when rolling the dough out but you’ll be sure to get a really good smooth finish.
Non-stick baking paper | Don’t be fooled by parchment paper as this is not non-stick and you may find your cookies stick to the paper when baked. You want a silicone lined non-stick baking paper, or better still a silicone mat.
Piping bags | For the decoration you will need a piping bag so you can pipe on the details of the gingerbread man.
Open star and writing tip piping nozzle | You can spread the buttercream onto the cookies but an open star nozzle will give you a nice detailed effect. You could also pipe the details onto the gingerbread men without a writing tip nozzle but the nozzle does allow for better precision and more professional look if that’s what you’re looking to achieve.
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OTHER CHRISTMAS COOKIES TO TRY
I would love it if you tagged me @mykitchendrawer on Instagram if you make these Gingerbread Man Sandwiches. It’s the biggest honour to see my recipes come to life in your kitchen and if you have any questions please don’t hesitate to drop me a message or let’s chat in the comments. Happy baking!
Gingerbread Man Sandwiches
Ingredients
- 145 g unsalted butter softened
- 150 g dark brown muscovado sugar
- 200 g dark maple syrup or treacle
- 1 egg large and room temperature
- 1 tsp vanilla paste
- 450 g plain flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 tbsp ground ginger
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 1 1/2 tsp all spice
- 1/2 tsp cloves
For the filling and decorations
- 100 g unsalted butter softened
- 200 g icing sugar
- 1/2 tsp ginger
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tbsp milk
- 50 g icing sugar for the decorations
- Sprinkles to decorate
Instructions
For the gingerbread men
- Beat the butter and brown sugar together until creamy and light, then add the maple syrup and mix through to combine.
- Add the egg and the vanilla and mix them though to combine well.
- In a separate bowl sift the flour, baking powder,salt and spices and sift them into the wet ingredients. Carefully mix the flour into wet mixture until its combined and comes together as a dough
- Split the dough into two, flatten it out a little into discs and wrap in cling film to chill for at least 2 hours (ideally 3)
- When the dough has chilled, preheat the oven to 170°C and line 2-3 flat baking sheets with baking paper.
- Flour a work surface and your rolling pin generously and roll out one of the doughs to 1/4 inch thick. Cut out your gingerbread man shapes then move them carefully onto your prepared baking sheet. Re-roll any scraps once and cut out more shapes if needed. Roll out the next batch of dough when all the first batch has been used up.
- Bake one sheet at a time for around 10 minutes until they have puffed up and are looking amber and delicious. They will still be soft when first removed from the oven so let them cool for 10 minutes on the baking tray before removing to a wire rack to cool fully.
For the decorations
- Make up a batch of buttercream by mixing together the softened butter and icing sugar until light and creamy. Add the spices and mix them through well then if using a piping bag, fill a piping bag fitted with an open star nozzle.
- Lay all the cookies out into pairs so they're lying next to one another. Lay one with the flat side up and pipe on a swirl of buttercream into the centre. Place the other cookie on top pushing it down a little.
- For the decorations mix together the 50g icing sugar with 1-2 tbsp of water until you have an icing with the consistency of tooth paste.
- Fill a new piping bag with this icing and pipe on the gingerbread details as you wish. Finish with a few sprinkles for buttons and leave the icing to set for 30 minutes.
